September saw millions of UK students head to university.
During this exciting time, they’re busy discovering all the new aspects of student life – meeting dozens of people, entering halls of residence and familiarising themselves with lecture halls. With so many distractions at hand, they’re unlikely to be thinking about the fact that with a new term and a new financial responsibility, means they have also become vulnerable to falling victim to a very targeted scam.
With more than £2 billion in payments having hit the accounts of students across the country, fraudsters have seized the opportunity of a new academic year to scam victims through phishing – a type of correspondence where the attacker purports to be from a reputable organisation to gain personal information, such as passwords and credit card numbers. In this case, they pretend to be from the SLC (Student Loan Company).
As the cost-of-living crisis continues to affect the most financially vulnerable – including students – staying safe online has never been more important. Cunning cybercriminals know that for many students, having a loan will be their first experience of managing a large sum of money. They use this knowledge to prey on those who are least expecting, therefore it’s important to remain vigilant.
To ensure students are protected, they need to know what to look out for and how to take precautionary action, while organisations have a responsibility to educate and warn about known…
